The Cubs, under new management, have been abysmal in 2010. How abysmal? So abysmal I bothered to look up “abysmal” to ensure I was spelling it correctly. The team’s grandest pick-up in the offseason was Texas’ former hitting coach (Chicago is hitting a 21st-ranked .257 as a team this season). They’ve got the third largest payroll in baseball behind the Yankees and Red Sox and three of their four best players this season have been Marlon Byrd, Tyler Colvin and Carlos Silva – none of whom play everyday. It’s abysmal enough that Lou Piniella’s most embarrassing attribute is no longer his old man gut. I mean, look at this picture above. Sweet Jesus, Sweet Lou – try an occasional salad.

I went to my first Cubs game on August 24, 1983 (an almost no-hitter thrown by Chuck Rainey against the Reds) and hundreds since then. I’ve watched thousands more on TV and miraculously, even a few playoff series, but I can’t stand this Cubs team. Can’t stand its attitude and can’t stand another season of losing. I’ve been in the gang for almost 30 years now and I’m considering getting jumped out of it. Blood in, homey. Blood out.

This isn’t about what team I should start following now (although your suggestions in the comments will be considered), this is about severing ties officially. And properly. And if at all possible, appropriately.

Below are 50 Ways To Leave Your Lover 10 ways to end long-standing loyalties to a franchise. Hop on the bus, Gus – we need to discuss much.

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10. Choose your new favorite team, wait for them to play your old favorite team, go to the game, loudly root for your new favorite team.
This one is cold. It takes gator blood to pull off, but if you do it, no one can question a) your seriousness or b) your decisiveness.  Non-sport equivalent: Convincing your girlfriend to bring her sister to the movies with you so she doesn’t sit at home by herself on a Friday night, only to make out with the sister during the movie while your (former) girlfriend is put in charge of refilling the popcorn.

9. Only draft players from your old favorite team to your fantasy team.
If you want to ensure you’ll never enjoy anything about your old favorite team ever again, synchronize their success with the success of your fantasy team. You’ll not only despise the real-life jerks underperforming on the club, but you’ll despise the stupid team you’ve built, the stupid friends in the fantasy league you’re in and the stupid stupids who invented fantasy sports in the first place.

8. Type “I love the  ____________ [your old favorite team] on your Facebook profile.
If there is any place more mean and snarky than the online gamers playing “Call of Duty,” it might just be the comments following someone’s super-positive status update on Facebook. So if you wanna feel real bad about liking a team, just tell your 658 Fakebook friends how great a baserunner you think Ryan Theriot is. You’ll be taken down quite a few pegs.

7. Heckle a player all game long.
About 10 years ago I found myself at a Louisville Bats (former Riverbats) triple-A game in Louisville, KY. Deion Sanders was there recovering from an injury and playing the outfield. There weren’t many people in the stands that day so we we free to roam whatever section we pleased. And we pleased to follow Neon Deion around for the seven innings he played that night. First we were in left-center, then we went over to the third base line and yelled into the dugout. And while I don’t remember what I was drunkenly slurring at him that night, I specifically recall thinking that I can never root for Sanders in anything he does from now on. Not after this. Not now. I had effectively projected King Midas’ touch onto Sanders, except that instead of gold, everything Sanders touched turned into something to which I was disinterested in paying attention.

6. Choose a player from your former favorite team who just left the team – become a fan of that player.
This is the coward’s way out. This is like rooting for the Bulls until Michael Jordan became a Wizard. Then rooting for the Wizards because you’re more of a Jordan fan than a Bulls fan. Then buying a Kwame Brown jersey after Jordan retired. This is like hanging out more and more with your buddy instead of your girlfriend until one day – surprise! – you announce you’re gay.

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5. Go ahead and bet a substantial amount of  money that your former favorite team will go all the way this year.
‘Cause let’s face it, they’re not going to win. No chance. If there were a chance, you’d still be a fan. But there isn’t a chance. And you betting that there is will make you feel stupid and angry. Why did you just put the money you were saving to buy CSI:Miami – the Complete Series on the Redskins to win it all this year? That’s not going to happen and now you’ll never have all of David Caruso’s wacky puns at your fingertips. Way to go, boner! The only thing you’ll hate more than yourself is the stupid Redskins for not winning the stupid Super Bowl, again! You’ll ignore that team as much as you would a thick girl with a bad personality.

Then again if they win, you’re rich and will probably rethink changing loyalties. Win-win!

4. Give your old team’s apparel to the most annoying kid on your block.
This is all about severing ties, not creating bonds. That’s why you don’t give your old ball cap or your hockey jersey to your sister’s newborn or your cousins toddler. In theory, you like those people and if they like your old favorite team, you’ll never be able to completely turn your back on the franchise. That’s why you find the friendless LARPer desperate for someone – anyone – to pay attention to him. Hand him your Dolphins jersey or your Habs hat and watch him light up. Then watch him go overboard trying to show his new best friend how big a fan he is. Every time you see your team’s colors, you’ll enter a Pavlovian state of annoyance in no time.

3. Wear another team’s apparel when you go out.
In the end, no one really knows what teams you follow in the privacy of your own home. And most bars play multiple games at one time. We are defined by who we wear, Gucci, so use that knowledge accordingly. If you’re meeting a buddy’s friend from out-of-town – wear your Lions hat. Even if you were silent all night, you’ll be remembered as “that Lions fan I met that one time.” St. Paddy’s Day at O’Houlihan’s? Wear all green … and an Avalanche hat. You’ll show up in pictures as the “guy wearing MOSTLY green.” These things define you. Let other people do the work for you. If you want to go from a Giants to a Jets fan (why anyone would want to do that is beyond me), just show up to a few bar crawls in a Jets hat all of a sudden. See how quickly you aren’t defined as a Jet-setter.

2. If you don’t think you’re going to marry the person you’re dating – start attending a bunch of games together.
It’s a tale as old as time, right? “I can’t listen to that song without thinking of her.” “We always used to eat there together.” “Every time we spelunked in that cave, we got attacked by bats.” Common stuff like that. Also common in many relationships is that moment of realization that the relationship just isn’t working. For most people, the realizationis quick, but the action that follows is slow and painful. Awful, really. “We can’t break up over Christmas.” “We can’t break up on Valentine’s Day.” “But Pulaski Day is our special day!” Add your favorite team’s season to that list and take your significant other to as many games as possible. Make it a thing you do – together. That way, when it ends, you won’t be able to oogle Laker Girls without tearing up a little. Not because you’re heartbroken, but because you’re disappointed you wasted so much time on the relationship. Then it’s just a matter of time before you find some other set of cheerleaders to oogle.

1. Google “celebrity _________ [your former favorite team] fans”.
Try it. You’ll run screaming from your computer. They’ll be nothing left from a team that interests you once you see the awful celebrities that love what you once loved. Rod Blagojevich, really? Jim Belushi? Gary Sinise? Pat Sajak? This blows. At least the White Sox have Obama.

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Photos courtesy of Flickr

Arizona passed an immigration-enforcement law last week making it justifiable for police to stop and demand documentation from anyone they suspect of being an alien “if reasonable suspicion exists” that they are in the state illegally. Already Senate Bill 1070 is considered in many parts of the country a wholly bigoted enactment, of which many throughout the nation have taken to protesting. The rationality behind some of the protests, however, remains suspect.

On Thursday, the Arizona Diamondbacks were in Chicago to play the Cubs. Not coincidentally, a pack of protesters picketing against Bill 1070 were stationed outside Wrigley Field.

… Because Justin Upton helped convince the senate to pass the bill? No? Well, then why the protesters in front of the Friendly Confines?

“The team is an ambassador for Arizona,” Tony Herrera, representative of ‘Boycott Arizona 2010’ said. “And the owner, Mr. (Ken) Kendrick, is a big supporter of Republican politics. This new law was a Republican bill. Until the law is changed, there should be protests.”

There should be protests. Next up should be the one where no one watches the movie “Psycho,” because it was shot in Phoenix and stars Arizona native Anthony Perkins. After that, the nation should turn its back on Jimmy Eat World and the Gin Blossoms, bands both born in the A-Z. What’s that? The nation has already stopped paying attention to them? Well … good.

As far as I can tell Jamie O’Neal’s “There Is No Arizona” is still perfectly acceptable to listen to.

Boycotting anything simply because it is connected to an entire state is a ludicrously misdirected attempt at forcing a repeal. (SIDE NOTE: Can we not agree that if the citizens were to start boycotting everything produced by a state simply because of what goes on in it, hat we’d start with Indiana?) The reasons, in this case, for the protest are also as misdirected in its facts as it is in its philosophy. According to the D-backs’ vice president of communications, Shaun Rachau, Kendrick has publicly opposed Senate Bill 1070 and is one of nearly 75 owners anyway, many of whom have not contributed a penny to the Republican Party.

“The D-backs have never supported (Senate) Bill 1070,” Rachau said, “nor has the team ever taken a political stance or position on any legislation.”

The undertones of bigotry and support of racial profiling enacted in this bill have forced Arizona and many of its public representatives, like the Diamondbacks, into a situation of which they were unprepared and certainly undeserving. Yet that hasn’t stopped citizens like Herrera from demanding satisfaction from such public organizations.

“The fact that Kendrick has supported the Republican agenda is significant to us,” he said. “We’re getting a lot of response from across the country. We’re asking for a meeting (with the team) on May 7 with people who are flying in from across the country. We want to talk to the team, but, you know, they do represent Arizona.”

What are these people jet-setting from around the country planning on asking the team, exactly? I’d love to meet Dan Haren, but not to discuss an immigration law of which he wasn’t a part. This kind of thinking is baffling. Yes, the Diamondbacks are a well-known Arizona-based organization. Yes, part of the team’s ownership has contributed to the Republican party (it’s a moderate red state, don’t forget), but leave ‘em alone. The reality of the situation is that none of the team’s players or staff have any more to do with this situation than private citizens. Yes, I’m sure Juan Guitierrez and Gerardo Parro have opinions on the matter, but what else can they give you? And why is picketing outside Wrigley or Citi or Coors Fields going to stop profiling in the American Southwest?

Americans are finally compelled to action and this is how they express themselves? By boycotting a team on a national level because it falls within the state’s 114,000 square mile territory?

Rep. Jose Serrano (D-NY) has the right idea. Don’t punish things connected to the state, remove things connected to the state. He’s already delivered a letter to MLB Commissioner Bud Selig requesting he move the 2011 All-Star Game out of Phoenix.

“MLB has a very loud megaphone,” Serrano said in a statement earlier this week, “and their rejection of Arizona’s action would be an important demonstration to Arizona that we do not tolerate such displays of intolerance in our nation.”

In a similar vein, the World Boxing Council said it will not schedule future bouts featuring Mexican fighters in Arizona. The organization has already gone so far as to have the ban approved by the Federation of Boxing Commissions of Mexico. It will be enacted May 1.

Taking action is a wonderful option empowered to the American public, but there are effective ways to do it and illogically inept ways to do it. Write your local government. Heck, write Arizona’s government. Initiate your time in any of the hundreds of civil rights groups protesting 1070. But c’mon Goofuses, let the players play.

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Top photo courtesy of Yahoo! Sports via the AP

Of the 10 most expensive sports tickets, eight belong to NFL teams (including Nos. 1 and 2 the Dallas Cowboys and New England Patriots respectively), one belongs to the NBA’s L.A. Lakers (No. 4) and the Maple Leafs sit comfortably as the third most expensive game ticket in all of sports.

The Maple Leafs. The 21-33-12 Maple Leafs. The second-worst record in the league Maple Leafs. The dead-last-in-each-of-the-last-three seasons Maple Leafs.

What gives, Canada? Why are you paying an average of $114 to see what amounts to a semi-pro squad? $168 for a premium seat? $172 after it’s been converted into Canadian currency? $212 if you include the price for all the beer it would take to make a sane person enjoy watching a hockey game? As a Cubs fan, I understand about paying for the experience more than the performance, but this?

This is bizarre. Or ingenious. Or both. Probably both.

Here’s a recap of the weirdest or most overlooked sports stories on the Interweb this week. Plus, as you’ve come to expect, all blondes look alike when they’re half-naked.

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Monday Turns out, college refs are human after all and should be blacklisted accordingly. College Basketball
Tuesday Yeah, Kim Sears is hot. But have you played “Call of Duty?” It’s really, really fun, man. Tennis
Wednesday Goats, Bartmen, Rookies of the Year, the World Series lie from 1918 … just toss Norman Rockwell on the pile of curses plaguing the Cubs. Baseball
Thursday A member of the U.S. speedskating teams thinks the team’s major sponsor, Stephen Colbert, is “a jerk,” doesn’t elaborate. Olympics
Friday If I told you the U.S. curling team would peddle condoms to earn money, would that be something you’d be interested in? Olympics
Saturday How do you know a boring game of hoops is happening? When the man with the ball stops to tie his shoe in the middle of play. Basketball
Sunday Nothin’ weird about this Tiger Woods clip from China … except maybe the officer’s mohawk. Other than that, totally normal.  Golf
Eighth Day Before crashing the White House party, Michaele Salahi crashed a D.C. Redskins reunion. In a vacuum, you have to admit, she’s a bit of a badass.

In a phone interview with the Chicago Sun-Times last week, Charlena Rector, the mother of beleaguered Cubs OF Milton Bradley, tried to come to her son’s aid and flesh out the motivation behind the recent frustrations that eventually led to his season-ending suspension.

Without even detailing exactly what Rector said, you just know there’s a whopper coming. Can you feel it?

Rector said that Bradley’s 3-year-old son as been subject to racial slurs at his school. His pre-school to be exact.

So here’s a good way to gauge what kind of person you are. Are you the type that hears something like that and immediately feels more sympathetic toward Bradley and suddenly fashion yourself a pseudopsychologist cleverly unspooling the ties that bind Chicago and racism in his mind? Or are you the type of person that had as difficult a time picturing 3-year-olds saying anything worse than “poophead” or “dummyface.” (Those, by the way, were not the slurs Ms. Rector claimed her grandson had been subject to).

Can 3-year-olds even speak clearly at that age? Aren’t they still breastfeeding? When do they get their drivers license? My timeline is all messed up.

Rector said that not only did her grandson’s classmates slur the poor boy, but teachers and other parents did too. Really? Other parents popped in to pick up their child and felt compelled to call a 3-year-old the nastiest word they could think of? Let’s say for a moment that this made perfect sense. Milton Bradley pulled down seven million bucks this year. There’s no other school anywhere in the greater Chicagoland area to which Bradley could transfer his son so that he didn’t face this type of abuse?

So the Bradley family believes a school whose teachers racially berate its students is the best Chicago has to offer.

If it was such a constant a treacherous attack, as Rector submits, was Bradley content to just stew about it and blame frat dudes sitting in Wrigley Field’s bleachers instead? His mother claims Bradley ”is a quiet person” and went on to say that ”he doesn’t want to talk about that because he doesn’t think anybody cares.”

Not talking to the press about your son is one thing. Allowing such an incident to go on long enough that you can’t muster any more than a piddling 40 RBIs and 12 homers suggests that the press aren’t the ones not caring in this situation.

”I watched his swing, and I could tell what was wrong,” Rector told the Sun-Times. She could tell that other kids’ moms were popping in, dropping swears on her grandson and then driving to arts & crafts class? That’s weirdly intuitive.

Let’s also assume that there’s a reasonable explanation for Bradley keeping his little boy in a school that sets mankind back 200 years. It’s September. Pre-school started only about a month ago. Before that, Bradley had the entire summer to deal with this problem. Before that, from mid-January (when he signed with the Cubs) to March (Spring Training in full swing) Bradley had nothing else to do. He was on vacation. He couldn’t have fixed the situation then? By Opening Day, this apparent display of racism amongst toddlers had to have been old news (if it was ever news to begin with).

Then Rector, in her Sun-Times interview, said something about how Bradley felt he’d never stack up to former Cub Mark DeRosa in the eyes of the fans. At that point I kinda tuned out.

It’s usually what happens when I’m overloaded with failed attempts at apologist nonsense.

We get it. Shane Victorino got $8 worth of beer dumped in his eyes. The kid who did it didn’t get caught. He spent 20 hours getting called every colorful collection of adjectives bloggers could concoct, then turned himself in. He apologized. It’s over. In the end, it was just spilled launched beer. That’s it.

But what if that wasn’t it? The facts of the situation are that the Victorino’s Phillies were embarrassing the Cubs in a mid-August weekday game between two teams in different divisions. If the game were interesting or meaningful, we wouldn’t be talking about beer. Unless …

When 12-year-old Jeffrey Maier reached over the Yankee Stadium bleachers to help Derek Jeter‘s pop fly become a home run in Game 1 of the ’96 ALCS series (which tied the game and helped send it into extra innings where New York eventually won the game and the series), the entire baseball world talked about it. And rightly so; that play changed history.

But Johnny Macchione, Wednesday’s beer-tosser, really only changed his history. As far as the game goes, his actions changed nothing. So let’s not talk about the real Johnny Macchione . Let’s talk about the hypothetical one. Let’s talk about the faux Macchione who hypothetically failed to learn his lesson from this incident. Let’s suppose he found his way to the Wrigley bleachers for Game 7 of this year’s NLCS series against Philly –

(What? Don’t look at me like that. It could stlll happen.)

Let’s also pretend that the game is 4-3 in the bottom of the ninth and the bases are loaded. And let’s say the hypothetical Macchione – nine innings worth of Miller Lite in his belly – dumps yet another cup onto Victorino and this time, he misses the catch. What then? The MLB rules stipulate:

Rule 2.00 (d) Spectator interference occurs when a spectator reaches out of the stands, or goes on the playing field, and touches a live ball. On any interference the ball is dead.

Rule 3.16 When there is spectator interference with any thrown or batted ball, the ball shall be dead at the moment of interference … if spectator interference clearly prevents a fielder from catching a fly ball, the umpire shall declare the batter out.

It seems pretty clear that no matter what happens to Victorino, the runs would not be allowed to score (unless the ump falls asleep on the play like Rich Garcia did in the afore-mentioned Yankee-Baltimore series). So for the home drunks, beer dumping isn’t a good RBI assist strategy. Assuming the umps will make the right call, what if a surprise beer dump happens when the home team is on the field?

What if it’s the top of the ninth in our hypothetical game and the Cubs are ahead 4-3. Let’s put Victorino at the plate now. He pings a laser down the line or off the ivy or anywhere close to a fan and the drunkard dumps something on the fielder trying to retrieve it. That too, is fan interference. And that too would should result in a dead ball. Victorino heads back to the batter’s box. For fun, let’s say Victorino then strikes out.

Is this hypothetical Macchione a hero in Chicago? What if that play gets the Cubs into the World Series where they eventually win? It happened to the Yankees in 1996.

For the record, I am not suggesting any Cubs buffoons try this. No one would want the Cubs to win this way. I don’t even like it when outfielders raise their hands instead of digging for the ball among the outfield ivy. Earn it, people. What I’m asking is: Would a hypothetical Macchione be as revered for an impeccably timed beer dump as, say, Steve Bartman was for his attempt at a foul ball in 2003?

There you go Cubs, all the reason you need not to let Victorino hit it anywhere down the line.

Boston baseball fans will tell you they have a sixth sense about their brethren. They’ll tell you they have inside information of their beloved team and the players connected to it that is otherwise unavailable to those foreign to Red Sox Nation. They’ll tell you they patiently waited out David Ortiz‘s horrific spring slump without boos or jeers because they knew – they just knew – Papi would turn it around. Without telling you that they know more than you, Sawx fans will tell you they know more than you.

Don’t believe ‘em.

These formerly nasty and hardened baseball elitists are melting faster than Greenland’s glaciers. They’re softening up like campfire marshmallows and they’re doing it twice as quickly. And if you don’t believe me, take a look at the ovation Fenway Pahk gave their former Rookie of the Year, Nomar Garciaparra, in his return to the place he spent 8 1/2 years being the face of the franchise.

“Backwards ramoN” earned two batting titles in 1999 and 2000 for the Red Sox, hit .323 for the team and .377 at Fenway, the highest average in that park of any active player with at least 1,000 at-bats. And for that, on Monday night, the Boston faithful were faithful to something besides Boston. Garciaparra tapped his chest, tipped his cap and looked around the familiar field as Bostonians showered one of the most popular Red Sox in the last 20 years with a one-minute standing ovation.

But this is Boston. Short of New York and Philadelphia fans, are there any more brutal louts crashing the games these days? There didn’t used to be. And Garciaparra is different than Ortiz’s struggles. For starters, he’s still on the team. Garciaparra left town a villain, right?

Remember?

Two months after sending Garciaparra to the Cubs in 2004, the Red Sox won the franchise’s first World Series in 86 years. His former teammates voted to give him a World Series ring. Curt Schilling noted that if it were not for Nomar, the Sox may not have been in a position to win at all that year. At the time, the decision to give Garciaparra a ring felt like a parent deciding not to ground their child for missing curfew for no other reason that they’re just relieved the kid is home safe. It’s over. Let’s do all we can to put it behind us. Even just two months after his departure, No-mah’s history with Boston was being rewritten.

So let’s rewrite the rewritten parts and look at the end of Garciaparra’s run in Beantown:

• After initially agreeing on a four-year, $60 million deal, Garciaparra wanted an $8 million signing bonus that would bring the total value to a Derek Jeter-ish $17 million per year. The Red Sox weren’t feeling it.
• In the offseason prior to 2004, Boston tried to get Alex Rodriguez, who at the time still played the same position as Garciaparra. Ain’t nothin’ quite as maddening as the guy you’re dating eyeballin’ another woman.
• Stories were written claiming Garciaparra felt that throughout the 2003 season management instructed the grounds crew to rough up the dirt at shortstop so it would be tougher for him to make plays.
• Because of his impending marriage, he refused to shave his head with most of his teammates during the 2003 ALCS (this one seems reasonable, but it’s just another example of the erosion that went on between Nomar and Red Sox fans).
• During a 13-inning grudge match with the Yankees in July 2004 (weeks before he’d be traded to Chicago), Garciaparra poutingly sat on the bench while teammate Pokey Reese made a number of crackerjack plays in his place.

But there he was on Monday, almost five years later, decked in Oakland’s gold and green stepping out of the batter’s box to acknowledge a throng of fans acting as if he retired in July 2004 instead of being catapulted the hell out of town. I’d expect that nonsense in San Diego or Kansas City or any place else that has easygoing fans satisfied with just having ever had a good player, even for a fleeting moment. But Boston? This isn’t the Boston I know. Where were the “NoMore Garciaparra”  or “Mr. Mia Hamm” signs? Something … anything. A 60-second standing O? That’s soft. Wicked soft.

“They’re crazy fans,” Terry Francona, manager of the Red Sox said on Monday. “But they’re so wrapped up emotionally in their team and people that have been a part of their teams.”

Francona’s right – to a point. They’re appreciative of the “good guys” of Boston’s past. But by the time Garciaparra left, he wasn’t considered one. And he’s never been back since. With Garciaparra, nothing about his situation with Boston changed except time.

And apparently it’s precisely that which has softened up Red Sox Nation.

Go HERE for the video of Garciaparra’s return to Fenway.

Here’s a recap of the weirdest or most overlooked sports stories on the Interweb this week. Plus, as you’ve come to expect, a technologically advanced excuse to get drunk in October.

Monday The Ultimate Warrior is not only still alive, but he’s blogging sarcastically about Michael Jackson. Personally, I would have gone with the “he’s a vegetable” reference from Wanna Be Startin’ Somethin’. Wrestling
Tuesday Motor bikers get into a slap-boxing match, look stupid. Why don’t helmeted athletes kick more? Motorbike Racing
Wednesday Drunk chick hits a golf ball in her back yard. It will either kill her or make her a god. Golf
Thursday My grandpa can beat up your grandpa … wait, your grandpa boxed for the British Army and beat up a robber last week? Nevermind then. Boxing
Friday Mets bats defy the laws of physics … at least they did a few years ago. Baseball
Saturday A Cubs fan vows to eat only 500 calories a day until the Cubs win five games in a row. This won’t do much to dissuade the stereotype that Cubs fans are idiots. Baseball
Sunday Nothing quite as awesome as t-shirts that conscientiously object to calling stadiums by their corporate names. I still call it Comiskey too. Baseball
Eighth Day The only thing that could make this app more painful is if it played John Mayer at the top of every hour.

Now that the bombshell mildly notable item that Sammy Sosa juiced has soaked into the core of your being, it’s time to start hunting for witches.

If you believe clean players ever existed, where were they in all of this? I’m aware of the brotherhood teams and organizations have, but think of the hundreds of players to go in and out of the league, isn’t it strange that no one but Jose Canseco – the poster child of steroid abuse – had anything to say about it?

Even more strange are the reactions of baseball personalities around the league after a revelation like Sosa’s has been made.

“That’s not that surprising at all,” Houston first baseman Lance Berkman said. “There are just certain guys that you pretty much know without coming out and making an…accusation, but it does not surprise me, not even a little bit.”

“You think the sun’s going to rise in the east tomorrow,” former Cubs announcer Steve Stone replied when asked if he suspected Sosa of steroid abuse. “Nobody really questioned who was doing what and it wasn’t my job as a broadcaster to ever question who did what.”

I’m not suggesting Berkman or Stone or anyone else ought to have talked to the press and made accusations that they couldn’t back up with proof. But these guys were basing their (ultimately correct) hunches on something. And it is that something that Major League Baseball has not sought after.

Also, is Stone’s position acceptable? He’s right that calling out his suspicions of steroid abuse isn’t what he’s paid to do. But if an international affairs news editor sees that the local news editor is printing false information, does he hold his tongue and risk a severe weakening of the overall product (the newspaper) because, hey, local news ain’t my division, man.

Sometimes to do your job right, you have to do more than is expected. Ironically, a bastardized version of this philosophy probably compelled a handful of the steroid users to start using steroids in the first place. This massive wave of silence by everyone makes it appear as if everyone thinks it’s not a very big deal. And if steroid usage in MLB isn’t a very big deal, isn’t that something MLB should concern itself with?

There were 135 players implicated, named in the Mitchell Report, suspended or confessed to having used steroids. The team pictured above – the 2001 Texas Rangers – watched 23 of those PEDestrians waltz on through the Arlington clubhouse. At what point does our suspicious glare stop resting on just the players and start inquiring as to who else on the 1998 Rangers or the 2001 Rangers or the 2003 Rangers knew about their star players? Every major league ball club had at least nine players on that list of 135 in their clubhouse at some point in their career, but why did, say the Houston Astros, the closest neighbors of the Rangers, manage only nine players? (Admittedly four of Houston’s players Ken Caminiti, Miguel Tejada, Andy Pettitte and Roger Clemens are big-time names in this scandal, but still…)

The Yankees had 27 of the 135 names in the clubhouse. The Mets? It had 23 of the named players, same as the Rangers. San Diego and Anaheim? They had 21.

So what?

So why haven’t we heard about the organization’s management? It’s more than plausible that the same organization that brought Rafael Palmeiro, Sosa and Tejada together in 2004 and 2005 were aware of something others weren’t. Sure, it could have been a coincidence. The fact that Canseco and Mark McGwire were on the A’s shooting steroids into each other’s butts 15 years before Tejada and Jason Giambi did it for the same team was probably a coincidence. But some of these things are not coincidences.

There are a lot of innocent people keeping their mouths shut. They’ve been keeping their mouths shut for a long time. Make sure you blame them too, right along with Barry Bonds, Bud Selig and Florida pharmacists. It’s easy to plead blind and dumb because it’s hard to disprove.

But take a look at the above picture from 2001. Four of those five guys are on the list of 135. And in 2000, there were two others on that Texas team (Dave Martinez and David Segui) and the year before that? Two others (Juan Gonzalez and Greg Zaun). And what about the year after this picture? Yup. Two more (Ismael Valdez and Todd Greene). That’s a locker room epidemic. And there ain’t no way everyone else in that locker room and in the owner’s box walked blindly through a lineup full of cheaters.

As a diehard Cubs fan, I’ve been pelted with questions about Sammy Sosa’s retirement announcement all week. I say pelted because every inquiry leaves an emotional welt, like pops from a paintball gun.

I never liked Slammin’ Sammy. Not in the ’98 home run race with Mark McGwire, not in the ’03 fungo bat incident and certainly not when he magically forgot how to speak English in front of Congress. I don’t dislike Sosa because of his assumed – but never proven (UPDATE: Proven) – steroid use. I didn’t like him before that was on anyone’s radar. Sosa was a garbage-time stat collector with a penchant for striking out when the Cubs really could’ve used a sac fly (he led the league in K’s in three different seasons and led the Cubs in Ks from 1997-2003). Of his 609 home runs, 326 of them were solo shots. 130+ of them came when there was a 4 or more run difference.

So, no. I’m not sad he’s retiring officially. I wasn’t sad when he unofficially retired in 2007 or the numerous semi-retirements he’s had since 2004.

But if there is anything I will miss about Sosa, it will be his sprint out to right field as Cubs announcer Wayne Messmer announced “Play Ball!” at Wrigley Field. He looked like a bull, and came charging out of the dugout like he knew something we didn’t. As the team’s star for much of the 90s, seeing him barrel into the outfield always seemed to come with a promise of something glorious.

Perhaps that’s why I never liked Sosa. Because every sprint promised something glorious. And for all its late 90s bluster, he never delivered. But Cubs fans always go back for more, don’t they? And Sosa’s gallop never ceased to fill me with hope. I waited as calmly for Sosa to be great as he said he’ll wait for an induction into the Hall of Fame. I suspect both will yield the same results.

So there you go. I’ll miss hoping for something great from him.